When the Lord sings 

God brings the best kind of epiphanies! The kind that shakes you to your core and lifts you higher than you ever knew possible.

In prayer last week, I had random song lyrics playing in my head. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d heard this song, and it was only fragments of the lyrics:

“Not another pretty face … I want your beautiful soul.”

I sat confused, pondering why these lyrics rolled through my head. According to Google, the lyrics belonged to Jesse McCartney’s Beautiful Soul.

[And no, I’m not trying to be a heretic by quoting a secular song. I promise the Lord was in this conversation.]

After I read the chorus and asked the Holy Spirit why this song was in my head, the revelation dropped that the Father wanted to sing a love song over me.

At first, I pushed back, not rejecting the idea outright, but certainly not feeling deserving.

The Lord has been working long and hard regarding my self-worth and how I should not call myself unworthy of the Father’s love if Christ Himself has made me worthy.

So after allowing myself to receive the Father’s love, I permitted myself the opportunity to explore the possibilities of the Father wanting to bless me in what seemed like an unusual way.

But I still couldn’t grasp an understanding of the phrase not another pretty face.

It wasn’t until the Holy Spirit pulled out a memory from my teenage years of an altercation between my earthly father and me.

I had forgotten this event had even happened! But the Holy Spirit took me back to that place and unpacked the emotions and effects of the event.

🤯

After I’d graduated from high school, I’d gotten hired on at a local BlockBuster (way back when those still existed! 😂). I remember really putting myself out there during the interview, being brave and courageous, despite my crippling anxiety.

When I got home that day, I shared the news with my parents that I’d been hired, and the first words out of my dad’s mouth were, “That pretty face won’t get you everywhere in life.”

I remember being stunned. For two reasons.

Firstly, I stood stunned by the fact my dad had called me pretty.

He’d never complimented me like that before. The usual attention I received from him was when he included me as the butt end of his jokes.

My dad never gave praise. I was never assured of his affections. In my home, you had to work to keep in his good graces. You had to strive for perfection, if not you’d face shame and ridicule.

However, the compliment wasn’t genuine. Because it indicated that he didn’t think I could get hired based on my own merits and only because of my pretty face.

I stood there demeaned and devalued by the man who should have taught me my worth and shown unconditional love.

That event (among many others) shaped how I viewed myself and how I formed relationships with other people.

Over time, these viewpoints also contorted how I envisioned God would see me or treat me.

For years I would subconsciously strive to be the perfect daughter so God the Father wouldn’t take His love from me. I strove to fit the mold, placing myself within the cookie-cutter image of Christianity so I would be found worthy to keep, love, cherish, value, etc.

The Lord has conducted a deep work in my heart to uproot such mindsets, teaching me the foundational truth that God’s love isn’t earned and that it is a free gift to receive.

However, the Holy Spirit bringing me back to that memory wasn’t to rehash learned truths. But to instead rewrite history.

To take a moment that had birthed out shamed and ridicule and rewrite it.

To remove the devaluing words spoken over me and release a fresh word from God the Father who loves and values me.

To take a painful history and replace it with a memory of my Heavenly Father singing a love song over me.

I’m not another pretty face. The Father finds my soul so beautiful and HE WANTS ME.

I never have to question my place in His household. I never have to doubt if God wants to keep me around. I never have to question His love for me.

I am assured of His affection for me!

I am at peace with God!

Moments like this–deep in the Father’s love–usher me into a greater level of identity and freedom.

This is an example of why I’m so passionate about sharing Jesus.

I want everyone to experience moments like this where they encounter the love, joy, and freedom found in the Father’s heart!!

“The Lord your God in your midst,

The Mighty One, will save;

He will rejoice over you with gladness,

He will quiet you with His love,

He will rejoice over you with singing.”

Zephaniah 3:17 (NKJV)

“He will rejoice over you with singing.”

Cue all the worship tears.

I know what it feels like to have the Father sing a song of love over me. And it is my prayer that the Father will bring you to a place where you may experience the same. In Jesus’ name. Amen.  ❤️